`Just Not Knowing Is The Hardest Part'

NORFOLK, Va. — Their spouses train to go "in harm's way." But Navy families were still shocked by Thursday's blast ripping a gaping, jagged and blackened hole into the USS Cole.

Information about sailors' fates was slow in coming. That made the wait excruciating for family members desperate for any word if their loved ones were dead, wounded or all right.

While waiting and hoping, Navy families did what they've done best for generations in crises: They pulled together.

The wife of Gunner's Mate Jeffrey P. Brown, who asked that her first name not be published, was coping the best she could, with prayer and help from friends and neighbors. The Navy was providing her and other family members a personal counselor, free long-distance calls, child care and a place to meet.

"But they don't have any information," Brown said, her voice straining slightly at times. "That's the worst thing. Right now, I'm on pins and needles. It's -- it's just bad.

"Just not knowing is the hardest part. I can't grieve because I don't know what to grieve for."

The Navy told Cole family members it would fly them to a military hospital in Germany if their spouses were injured, she said. Some might dread such a trip. Not Brown.

"I would rather fly to Germany and pick him up with no arms and legs," she said, "than to meet a casket at the airport."

Spouses whose loved ones were not on the Cole sympathized.

"You get a lot of mixed emotions," said Tammy Martin, whose husband serves on an aircraft carrier. She also provides long-term care for the children of sailors.

"Your thoughts and prayers go out to them and you know how they feel, but then in the same breath you think, `Thank God, it's not me.' You feel guilty about feeling that way.

"We live our lives on a `What if?' basis," said Martin. "Today my kids had to watch CNN instead of Blue's Clues."

Bill Slingerland, the top enlisted man in the Atlantic Fleet's surface forces, said there's a tremendous outpouring of support from virtually all facets of the community, military and civilian.

"Everybody in a Navy town is calling and offering their support," he said. "It's a groundswell that's felt. Anyone that's ever gone to sea certainly can feel some compassion for what the families are feeling."